Is global warming science a done deal?

Letters to the editor on climate change and 'Unsettled science' op-ed, for Feb. 25, 2014

Can’t wait for certainty

“I’ve long believed that it cannot be good for humanity to be spewing tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.” If that’s Charles Krauthammer’s belief, why does he expend so much energy confusing his readers (“Unsettled science,” Feb. 22).

“I also believe that those scientists who pretend to know exactly what this will cause in 20, 30 or 50 years are white-coated propagandists.” No one says they know “exactly what this will cause.”

Can any physician predict the exact course of a cancer diagnosis? Of course not. But is that reason enough to refuse chemo when the doctor prescribes it? Do our climate scientists know if this cancer is lethal? If they do, I’d like to pay attention. For my children’s sake, I can’t wait for the 100 percent prediction.

Climate change threats exist

Climate science may be incredibly complex, but risks can be assessed. While modeling can’t predict all variations, 98 percent of peer-reviewed climatologists warn of danger.

Many models are remarkably successful, but none is perfect, especially in gauging exactitudes. (Will La Nina appear and cool surface air but swirl heat deeper into oceans?)

Krauthammer mentions a couple of misleading points. He may claim to be agnostic on climate, but he sounds uninformed, scornful and reckless rather than contemplative of threats nearly all climatologists, National Academy of Science, military strategists, reinsurers, oil industry, etc., say we face, and we already see.

Here’s a reasonable analogy: Modeling can’t say exactly which cigarette smokers will die and when, but the risks are scientifically settled.

John Reaves

San Diego

Op-ed was factually wrong

Regarding Charles Krauthammer’s article that global warming as “settled science” is a myth, there is no scientific debate that CO2 is a potent greenhouse gas. Also, it is known that CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere is rising, and the average global temperature is rising with it. Evidence of global warming is seen in melting glaciers and Arctic ice.

Krauthammer cites a study that mammograms don’t reduce breast cancer deaths. He then asserts that if something as “certain” as the need for mammograms isn’t “settled science,” global warming can’t be “settled science.”

Krauthammer doesn’t mention the mammograms in this study were taken three decades ago using outdated equipment, and interpreted by doctors not trained in mammography. Climate science, like medical science, is constantly advancing. Today’s climate scientists are highly trained in their field — they are not, as Krauthammer states, “white-coated propagandists” and “whores.”

Krauthammer’s rant is factually wrong. It illustrates his ignorance more than it discredits the climate scientists he castigates.

David Engel

Founder, STAY COOL for Grandkids

Del Mar

Global chaos out there

For a long time the term “global warming” has been bandied about. Our society tends to take terms literally. Such is not the case for this term.

The correct terminology is “climate chaos,” which contains a much broader sense of what is happening with our climate.

The editorial cartoon last week showed a snow filled town with a comment about global warming and something John Kerry said. While the East Coast is buried in snow, we on the West Coast are parched beyond belief.

We need to take climate chaos seriously. We need to quit being so self-centered and see the big picture. We need to quit watering golf courses instead of cutting off water to the Central Valley. We need to tighten our belts and become conscious adults by letting go of our “wants” to the detriment of the good for all.

Sali Weiss

Bankers Hill

Hypothesis is considered true

Charles Krauthammer’s op-ed “Unsettled science” demonstrates an unscientific approach to a scientific matter. Science becomes settled when essentially all scientific research on a topic either adds evidence to further prove a hypothesis, or takes as a given the underlying hypothesis is true. In the case of climate science, 97 percent of climate experts agree humans are causing global warming.

Barack Obama, in his latest State of the Union address said, “Climate change is a fact.” Krauthammer is wrong to say that statement is anti-scientific. Krauthammer is the one who is anti-scientific.

Now, it is unfortunate that Obama blamed the California drought on climate change. In the sense this year’s drought is a weather event, it is unscientific to blame a single weather event on climate change. If the average California weather becomes, say dryer over an extended multidecade period, that could be connected to climate change.

Dwain Deets

Encinitas

Global warming is unsettled

In reply to Charles Krauthammer’s “Unsettled science” op-ed Feb. 22, I disagree with his assertion ... ”It cannot be good for humanity spewing tons of CO2 into the atmosphere.”

CO2 is not a pollutant, it’s plant food. We all die without it.

The rest of his commentary I’m in agreement with. The science is not settled, though the global warming and it’s-our-fault crowd says it is. Their goal has a lot more to do with extorting wealthy nations and giving the money to poor nations while extracting a generous administrative fee for themselves.

It’s the progressive redistribution of wealth in play and their using environmental concerns as the tool for that redistribution. Methane is a much more potent and prevalent global warming agent. Progressives can’t use that gas to justify their extortion agenda because it’s not emitted by industry and vehicles.

The primary cause of global warming and cooling is the sun and the Earth’s rotation around it. There are variables in the sun’s intensity and in the Earth’s trajectory as it circles the sun. There have been many global warming and cooling periods over billions of years, long before SUV’s roamed the Earth. The Science of predicting climate change for a month much less 50 years has proved to be flawed.

Rob Schick

Santee

Unsettled add

Saying 98 percent of world’s climate experts agree about global warming is like saying 98 percent of pro baseball players like baseball. That’s their profession, and it pays well. It’s good to know that we now have the first “settled science” known to man.

Gary Guodace

San Diego

Global warming crowd missing its marks

The writer goes on, repeating the canard that “98 percent of climate experts agree.” Would someone please tell me where I can find the “study” that backs up that assertion? Exactly how many “climate experts” are there in the world? How does one qualify as a “climate expert.”

The writer goes on to assert that storms like Sandy or Halyan will occur with greater frequency. A similar statement was made after Katrina. More “killer” hurricanes would follow, with greater and greater frequency. They didn’t. They’ve actually dropped in frequency. The same can be said for “killer” tornadoes.

In 2008, Al Gore predicted to a German audience that in five years the North Pole would be “ice-free.” At one time, it was said, “2010 will be the turning point.”

But not to worry. The religion of global warming is learning. Don’t show anyone your data. Don’t show anyone your protocols for data analysis. Don’t mention your computerized predication models aren’t even close to observed reality. Don’t call it “global warming,” call it “climate change.” Never mention the “hockey-stick.” And what ever you do, having been wrong so often, don’t give a firm time period for a future event.

Dan Shapiro

Oceanside

CO2 propaganda

Follow the tax revenue money. Fifty years ago both global temperature and carbon dioxide (CO2) appeared to be increasing over a short time period. A causative relationship was hypothesized. Now we have more data over a longer time period. From over 90 proxies from tree rings to isotopes in sediment cores we have reconstructed global temperatures and CO2 density over the last 600 million years. We have not been able to establish even a plausible causality between CO2 density and global temperature.

During the last four interglacials, global temperature was much higher while CO2 was much lower and CO2 increased 800 years after, not before global temperature increased. In this interglacial, while CO2 has increased 57 percent in the last 7,200 years, in the last 8,000 years global temperature has gradually decreased by 2C. The multicentury Holocene, Roman and Medieval Warm Periods were warmer than now, while CO2 was much less.

In the last 17-plus years, CO2 has increased 10 percent while global temperature has paused and even cooled in the last eight years.

Unable to surrender a revenue producing stream, politicians, capitalists, and ideologues have resorted to other false climate alarms. But weather records show that in the last few decades extreme weather events are less frequent, less destructive, less costly and of shorter duration. Natural ocean acidification varies on a seasonal or hourly basis far more than we are warned to appear in a hundred years. While the absolute rate of sea level change is decreasing, apparent sea level change depends on local conditions like subsidence (Southern California) and glacial rebound (Pacific Northwest).

If the U.S. eliminated all man-made CO2, it would be replaced in seven years by India and China. Taxpayers and ratepayers need to become better informed and to unite against this destructive propaganda.